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Allen C. Guelzo
DELAWARE, Ohio – “Between 7,000 and 9,000 were killed outright,” Civil War historian Allen C. Guelzo writes of the three-day Battle of Gettysburg. “That’s six times the number of U.S. soldiers killed on D-Day and several times the number of overall U.S. D-Day casualties. It’s also almost four times the number killed at Pearl Harbor.”
“[Gettysburg] proved that the American proposition was so precious that Americans would willingly sacrifice their lives rather than see it destroyed by civil war,” Guelzo states. “In 1863, that was a wake-up call to every king, emperor, and dictator to realize that the ordinary democratic citizen could rise up to be as terrible as any professional soldier. One hundred and fifty years later, it still is.”
Guelzo, author of The New York Times bestseller “Gettysburg: The Last Invasion,” will discuss “Gettysburg: the Waterloo of the Rebellion” Oct. 10 when he delivers Ohio Wesleyan University’s 2013 Richard W. Smith Lecture in Civil War History.
Guelzo, Ph.D., also is the Henry R. Luce Professor of the Civil War Era at Gettysburg College in Pennsylvania and the director of its Civil War Era Studies Program. In addition, he is the first two-time winner of the prestigious Lincoln Prize – earning awards in 2000 for his book “Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President” and in 2005 for “Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation: The End of Slavery in America.”
Guelzo will speak at 8 p.m. Oct. 10 in the Benes Rooms of Ohio Wesleyan’s Hamilton-Williams Campus Center, 40 Rowland Ave., Delaware. His presentation is free and open to the public.
Ohio Wesleyan’s annual Smith Lecture is named in honor of emeritus history professor Richard W. Smith, and each year features a national Civil War scholar. Past lecturers in the series, which began in 2002, have included Pulitzer Prize-winners James M. McPherson, author of “Battle Cry of Freedom: The Civil War Era,” and Eric Foner, author of “The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery.”
Learn more about the OWU Department of History and the Smith Lecture at https://www.owu.edu/academics/departments-programs/department-of-history/. For those interested in the Civil War era, Ohio Wesleyan will present “The Secret War of Emma Edmonds,” a new play written by OWU faculty member Bonnie Milne Gardner, for five performances between Oct. 4 and Oct. 13. Based on a true story, the play explores the life of Edmonds, a woman who claimed to have spent two years serving as a male soldier in the Union Army. For performance times and tickets, visit https://www.owu.edu/academics/departments-programs/department-of-theatre-dance/.
Ohio Wesleyan University is one of the nation’s premier small, private universities, with more than 90 undergraduate majors, sequences, and courses of study, and 23 NCAA Division III varsity sports. Located in Delaware, Ohio, just minutes north of Ohio’s capital and largest city, Columbus, the university combines a globally focused curriculum with off-campus learning and leadership opportunities that translate classroom theory into real-world practice. OWU’s close-knit community of 1,850 students represents 47 states and 57 countries. Ohio Wesleyan was named to the 2013 President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll with Distinction, is featured in the book “Colleges That Change Lives,” and is included on the “best colleges” lists of U.S. News & World Report and The Princeton Review. Learn more at www.owu.edu.